Promises
by Eternal Contradiction
Summary: Companions of the Night by Vivian Vande Velde: A late-night disagreement between Kerry and Michel. Smutfic one-shot.


_**Promises**_

Kerry/Michel Smutfic. You have been warned. This was written for Trumpet Geek's birthday to celebrate the fact that after years of prodding, she finally read CotN (and, of course, fell in love with Michel). Also, I don't own CotN, even if it's starting to look like I've obsessed over it longer than VVV has.

x.x.x

She didn't like the spring. Invariably, when the winter months became temperate, snow melting in the heating sun, she would look to the sky later each night for the pitch of nightfall falling over the warming air. She wouldn't see the hope of summer, her spirits wouldn't lift at the idea of the sun joining the earth for a greater period every evening. Kerry wasn't like most people: she didn't get depressed in the winter, feeling hopeless with every night it became dark before supper-time. She enjoyed the magicalness of the night, even so far as she would claim she was a night owl or a vampire to her friends.

The truth was that she might be a night owl, but she certainly wasn't a vampire. She was simply in love with one, and that was enough to make her resent the summer months. She hated that the seasons took away the precious time she was able to spend with Michel, as he never seemed to have time for much more than finding a bite to eat during the summer before he was forced back into death.

Though sometimes she thought that he possibly didn't care to spend time with her on most evenings and summer was just a handy excuse. She could never quite figure out why or how she got to be in this position, living in one of those beautiful old houses he seemed to collect like others collect cd's or cats, and being some sort of beard for him in a way she hadn't even begun to fathom as he trolled the clubs for a new lover a few times a week, undetected by those who would harm him. As unsure exactly what it was he was getting out of the arrangement except for the cover that she afforded with her ability to walk freely during the daytime, Kerry knew that on paper she was getting the better deal. She didn't have to pay rent for her awesome room with the in-suite bathroom, and for every tenant she brought in to fill the other rooms, she was able to keep their rent money to go towards tuition or new shoes.

Off paper, however, Kerry was very aware that she was getting the short end of the stick. Every time she saw him walk into the house with lipstick on his cheek, or even worse, a new girl on his arm, her heart wilted a little. Sometimes she thought she wouldn't be able to stand it anymore, and then he would look at her and give her a rare smile and a flirtatious wink, engage her in banter, and she would be willing to do anything for him, for however long he needed it. In the pit of her stomach she knew he was toying with her, keeping her in line, but at the same time she reasoned that he had chosen her for this above everyone else he had ever met, and that probably meant something.

Right?

So every night she would stop what she was doing if she was in the house and find something to do downstairs – in the winter it was easier, as there was a valid reason for her to be fixing food in the kitchen for supper when he awoke – where she would watch the sun set through the windows and listen for the sound of his movements in his basement apartment. Some nights she heard nothing, and she would immediately look out the window for his car, worrying if she didn't see it parked in the driveway. Other nights she would smile as the water ran for his shower, and sometimes she would frighten her housemates by laughing as the tenors of his strong voice echoed through the walls as he sang.

Tonight she was sitting at the kitchen table, her laptop open in front of her to one of the assigned readings for her classes. She watched as the light around her waned and night finally fell. Moments later, Michel wandered up the stairs, his hair dishevelled around his shoulders from where it had grown over night. He was only wearing a pair of jeans, hastily pulled on and Kerry felt her breath catch in her throat as he emerged from the basement.

"It's only my chest," he informed her, looking down at his bare torso and then back to her with a slight frown playing along his features.

"Well, I can't help it if I find you attractive like the dozen of girls parading through here weekly. You'd be pretty screwed as a vampire if you weren't."

"Oh," he said with a slight smirk as he straddled the chair across from her. "But then I would simply use my powers of persuasion to make them see me as a God. But now that you mention it, unattractive vampires don't last very long. Why do you think that is?"

Kerry shrugged, pretending to go back to her studies though she was interested in his conversation. Rarely did he share secrets of his kind with her these days, even if they were mostly all lies. "Because they can't find people willing to offer blood."

Michel gave her a secretive smile with a slight shake of his head, as though marvelling at her naivety. "We can always find someone willing to share blood with us, though I don't have much need to go to them myself. No. I think it's because we kill off the weaker vampires ourselves."

"Survival of the fittest," Kerry responded in a distracted way. "Ensuring the strong survive and those who would drag you under don't get the chance." She wanted to look at him over her computer screen, but didn't. If he hoped to shock her, she wasn't taking the bait.

"What if I told you that I don't think you would make a strong vampire?"

"Well, I'm not giving you the chance to find out, now am I?" Kerry asked. "I don't want to become a vampire. I have no interest in it."

"Ok then," he conceded with a quick grin. "What if I told you that I think you would probably last longer than I have, and that I believe that if I ever turned you that you would quickly adapt and leave me behind? Are you still not interested?"

Kerry lowered the screen to her laptop so she could observe him, her heart feeling oddly heavy at the way he had worded the sentence. Was he scared she would leave him? Kerry was sure he wasn't, but maybe he saw things differently in a way she had never imagined before. "I know you're not seriously offering to turn me into a vampire, so what is all this about?"

He looked away from her, his eyes focusing on his reflection in the glass of the window, and beyond. "Sometimes I want... it's nothing."

"If I was going to leave, I would have left already," she informed him. "I wouldn't still be here putting up with your crap."

He gave her a measured look though she tried for an expression of nonchalance. He then snorted in dry mirth. "Put up with my crap? How do you think I like the way you lie in wait for me to appear and grace you with my presence like some love-struck child turned stalker?"

That hurt. "I've never lied to you about my feelings," Kerry responded frostily. "And yes, I do put up with your crap. I never say anything when you deliberately bring your dates through the house instead of using your private entrance, just because you know I'm sitting on the couch watching a movie."

"Maybe you should!" Michel slapped his palm against the table for emphasis, leaning forward to stare her down with furious eyes. Kerry hadn't expected to see that level of hostility, believing that they were having one of their harmless spats that occasionally took the place of witty banter. "Instead of sitting on the couch like a puppy dog waiting for scraps of attention, you should demand it."

"Demand it?" Kerry asked shrilly, rising from her seat to look at him with disbelief. "I'm sure that would go over well. If I demanded you pay attention to me, you'd swat me away and give more similes of me being like a petulant child or something. You wouldn't be like 'oh sure Kerry, I have a free hour' because that would mean you aren't the one in control."

"Am I in control now?" he asked dangerously. "Because it doesn't seem like I am when you bring strange men into _my house_ and let them fuck you."

Kerry turned red, pausing with one hand braced against the counter. She gaped at him, trying to find coherent words to respond but only able to come out with a nonsensical string of false starts. "I.. you... it wasn't... why are you... yes, I did." She crossed her arms across her chest. "Is there a problem?"

"You're not to do it again."

Kerry laughed, hiding a wince at how bitter it sounded. "You're forbidding me from having sex? Way to be a hypocrite Michel. Why don't you just not listen next time?"

"Because it's impossible to ignore!" he hissed. "With you moaning and screaming his name as he touches you. And wondering if you were thinking of me as you came."

Kerry's breath caught in her throat again and she felt her body respond to his words. She wanted to both jump him and slap him, her cheeks growing brighter red with embarrassment and fury even as her hormones kicked in and she could feel the way he turned her on. "Yeah," she responded sarcastically instead of giving in to either urge. "About the same way you think of me with Steph, Jane, and Mary Sue."

He gave her a cold look. "Don't be glib. I don't want him here again."

"That wasn't glib. This is glib: bite me!" Then she turned her back on him, moving to leave the room. She was almost expecting it when he soundlessly moved away from the table, slamming bodily into her and pushing her against the counter in bruising force. His lips hovered across the skin of her neck, barely touching as he bent her over, pulling her ass back sharply against his pelvis.

"I'm tempted," he warned, breath cool against her skin. "I'm so very tempted to teach you the lesson you deserve right now. But then maybe you want me too, hmmmm?"

She meant to say something sarcastic, something to continue this angry tension-filled banter they were continuously tossing at each other, but his hands were moving up her thighs, harsh and pinching as he moved her skirt out of the way, and she found she couldn't say anything.

"Kerry," Michel pleaded, his forehead braced against her shoulder, nose pressed into the tender flesh at the base of her neck. She didn't know what he was asking, if he wanted her to tell him to stop or to encourage him to continue. For some reason he had stopped, not going through with the lesson he had been trying to teach. She thought maybe he just wanted her to say something, to reinforce his anger with her.

"Michel," she whispered, pushing herself back against him, feeling the outline of his cock through the layer of his jeans. Her skirt was hiked around her hips, and she could feel the wetness between her legs seep down her thighs. "Please," she begged.

He was still for a moment, not moving or breathing as she shook with need. Finally, he pressed his lips against her neck, giving her a soft kiss as his hand unbuttoned his jeans. Kerry's heart was pounding and the seconds seemed to stretch on forever despite his quick dexterity. Then he was inside her in a sharp movement that took her breath away. She moaned, not needing to pretend that the feeling of his cock inside of her was the most exquisite thing she had ever experienced.

"Never again," he promised her, pushing into her with a force that left her gripping the counter with whitened knuckles.

"What?" Kerry asked in a daze, not following the conversation. For a moment she was chilled by the idea he meant this.

"You'll never have a guy over again. The only time you're going to come in this house is with me or by yourself."

Kerry gasped as he twisted his hips on a thrust, catching her off-guard with the change of angles. "You're evil," she breathed, her skin damp with sweat and the need for release quickly building through her blood until her body was burning for him. She knew she would promise him anything he wanted and would never consider going back on her word.

"Kerry?" he questioned, waiting for her answer. He didn't stop or slow his tempo, not playing a game with her where he withheld her orgasm until she promised him the world. She didn't have any defence against honesty from him in this odd little baring of his soul.

"I promise."

He rested his head back against her shoulder, and she couldn't help but wonder if it was relief that made him do so. His talented fingers snaked around her hips, stroking hard against her clit until she was trembling in his arms, so close she could taste the scream on her tongue. "I want you," he told her, teeth biting gently on her neck without breaking skin. Kerry keened, her knees giving out as she came apart with his name on her lips. He pushed her tighter against the counter, sighing in her ear as he came.

Kerry was panting hard as he pulled out of her, brushing her skirt down modestly. She turned, still in his arms, to see his dark-blue eyes observing her intently and unapologetically. She wanted to ask him what he meant when he said he wanted her, but instead she kissed him. His mouth was warm from her skin and pliant against hers and she ran her tongue along the space between his lips, teasing him with the idea that she would try for admittance into his mouth. She felt loose and carefree from the sex, and emboldened by the knowledge that he sat downstairs in his apartment, listening to her the same way she did for him.

x.x.x

©RelenaFanel.Sept7.2008

:D


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